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Styli anos goes beyond the call of duty for his patients at Miami Children's Hospital.

61 superdo ct ors .com

r. Steven Stylian os examines

a chart for a n ICU patient at Mi am i Children's Hospital

(MCH). In side a glass incuba­

tor lies his tiny pat ient, who, at just over two po unds, is no bigger than a kitten .

His still-developi ng eyes are covered so the ligh ts that keep him warm won' t damage

the m . A tiny stocking cap is pe rched on his head, and his diaper, about the size of

a cocktail napkin, is loose and gaping.

H e ca me in to the world unready, bu t he's not giving up . Neither is Stylian os.

D esp ite the tu be down his trac hea, Stylianos po in ts to the tiny, p umping chest. "H e's breat hing on his ow n," he

says . "H e's a fighter."

H ealing "little people," as Stylianos calls his patients, is the work he says he was bo rn

to do. "1 ended up right where I belong,"

says the soft-spoken chief of pedia tric sur­gery at M CH. T he statem ent holds double me ani ng for Stylianos-Miami is where the

story of his family began .

Stylianos was bo rn to immi gran t parents.

H is father, from Cyprus, and his mo ther, from Greece, met in Miami in the late '40s.

T hey lived in Miami for a few years before relocating to Dumont, Nj., a small, blue-col­

lar town about 10 miles from New York City. "My parents were childre n of the war," he

says. "So the values they taught were hard work and the importance of edu cation."

As a teenager; his interests were mo re

aligned with soccer and rock 'n' roll than school. "I was good in scho ol, bu t didn't

have concrete aspirations," he says. That changed after a high school guidance coun­

selor told him he had the stuff to make a grea t doctor. "1 never really had guidance

before," Stylianos says. "Tha t's a function of immigrant parents. T hey don't know .. .

they j ust wan t you to be som ebody."

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The Children's

Champion After gTaduating from Rutgers Un iversity,

he atte nded New York U niversity for medical school, followed by a Colum bia residency and a Harvard fellowship. " It was a nice ascent," he says.

His upward motion included a stop at Englewood H ospital in NewJ ersey, where he worked as an orderly in the X- ray departmen t. T here he met an ultrasound technician named J oann, who became his wife. "She grew up in a sma ll town, too," he says. 'After we bought our first home, we'd take walks after dinn er. Heading

.back to the house, we'd just laugh looking at it, like, 'This can 't be real. ?'

Years and milesaway from his orderly days, Stylianosjoined MCH's surgical staff in 2005, and was elected chief of its depar t­ment of pediatric surgery in 2006. Prior to lVICH, Stylianos worked at Children's Hospital of New York, where he served as director of the operating room. It was in those corridors that he honed his skills in separating conjoined twins, successfully separating three pairs throughout his tenure.

"It has to be a passion," Stylianos says of pediatrics. "It 's not work to go into if you don't feel a visceral connec­tion to it. Anytime you can affect the life of a child in such a pro found way, it's an incredible feeling."

Stylianos' work is his life, and he gives all that he can . If your child recen tly had surge ry, he'll check in on a Sunday. H e gives ou t his cell number and e-mail address. And he's known for figura tive (and literal) handh olding throu gh a scary test or two.

"He tr ies to red uce the fear," explains J ackie Gonzalez, sen ior vice president and chief nursi ng officer at lVIC H . " He makes time to answer qu es­tion s and con nect. You 'd never see him

The chief of pediatric surgery at Miami Children's Hospital is exactly where he belongs

by G.K. SHARMAN photography by BRIAN IMM KE

rush thro ugh an exp lanation or cut short com munication with a family."

The human connection is his strength.. "He 's a good technical surgeon," says Dr. Michel Nahmad, the hospital's former chief of pediatr ic surgery. "But when you're operating on kids, that's not enough."

He needed all his abilities to save con­jo ined twins Carme n and Rosa Taveras. T he surgery required non-scalpel skills like confidence and maturity-he was only a first-year ("a real newbic") when the Taveras family came looking for a miracle at Columbia in 1992.

The twins were attached at the pelvis, their legs straight out in a "splits" position, and shared several internal organs, with one bellybutton between them. "T hey were two gorgeous little babies who hap­pened to be stuck together," Stylianos says.

In a mee ting with his mentor, Dr. Peter Altman, Stylianos laid out his vision, everything from pre-o p imag­ing to where the first incision should be mad e. Altman's response? "Sounds good . T hey're yours."

'1\s a first-year, you're aching to show your stuff," Stylianos says. So he assembled a team that included 50 pro­fessionals for different roles; his was to reconstruc t the girls' bowels.

Sixteen years later, the twins are happy and healthy. Rosa, the more laid­back sister, describes Stylianos as "the best doctor ever."

"He was so kind to me and my fam­ily," she says. T hey've kept in touch with him over the years.

"T here 's something spec ial abo ut conjoined twins," he says. "T here's something about separating them that defies our mind set. It 's no t ju st anatomy we' re separating."

Although Stylianos still spends time in the operating room, he's also focused on spreading MCH's mission. "We've recen tly cha rtered an affiliation with Florida International University," he says. "MCH will serve as the aca de mic cen ter in pediatrics for the school. We're committed to finding the right bal­ance of clinical, expert ise, research and education to do what we can to ensure our care is accessible to kids in South Florida and beyond, into the Caribbean bas in and South America ."

Stylianos attrib utes his success to hard work and good timing. But he also has a firm suppo rt network inJoan n and his three daughters, Alex, 22, Vanessa, 19 and Sophie, 17. "We are very close," he says. "I have such great kids, and I married the perfect person: someone who loves to travel and eat." T he Stylianos' favorite cuisine? '1\ny," he says with a laugh.

By moving to Miami-where his parents met decades ago-his life has come full circle. "When we moved her e, they came down from NewJ ersey, where they still live, and I took them bac k to the little church where they got marr ied 52 years ago," he says. "It was incred­ible. It 's all incredible, really. My career is a dream come true for them. I have to pinch myself sometimes. I' m living the American dream. " .

FLORIDA SUPER DDCTORS 2009 - SOUTH FLORIDA EDITION 17